gaia & his ex, samantha

I was walking in the East Village on a rainy nite in late September and I saw this guy (who I learned is/was Gaia) pasting on a mural (image on right) to the plywood facade of mid-construction storefront with a broom. I stopped b/c I’ve always been interested in knowing the material that street art murals are made of … I asked him this question and felt the material. I also asked him if he worried about doing this on a busy street at a relatively early hour. He told me that the ‘cops know what’s good’. I asked him if he is influenced by the artist Swoon and he said ‘oh yeah, I know Callie .. yeah her work is good’. I realized that maybe I was confusing some of his work for hers and I asked him if he ever worked in Bed-Stuy. We confirmed that the woman w/ a panther atop (or eating) her head was indeed his work – a rendering of his ex-girlfriend, Samantha – at the corner of Tompkins and Halsey.